RAISING RESEARCH FUNDING
Former prime minister Jean Chrétien has been named honourary chair of an ambitious campaign to raise $50 million for innovative medical research right here in our community, it was announced at The Ottawa Hospital’s major gala Saturday night at The Westin hotel.
The Tender Loving Research Campaign is being led by Greg Kane, counsel at Dentons Canada LPP.
He’s past board chair of The Ottawa Hospital Foundation and co-chair of the hospital gala committee, along with Whitney Fox.
The evening, which sold out months ago, drew a who’s who of doctors, business leaders and politicians for a night of dinner, dancing and celebration of advances in local medical research.
The 650 attendees included Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, Bank of Canada governor Stephen Poloz and local Liberal MPPs Bob Chiarelli, John Fraser and Yasir Naqvi, the latter of whom may soon see the inside of a hospital: His wife, Christine McMillan, is expecting their second child this winter.
Also among the special guests was popular news anchor Lucy van Oldenbarneveld from CBC Ottawa. She’s been off air while fighting breast cancer, but has joined the campaign as an ambassador.
For sure, it helps to recruit household names like Chrétien and Lucy van O to the cause, but what some might not know is that Chrétien has a brother, Dr. Michel Chrétien, who’s famous in his own right as a medical research scientist. It’s in his name that the hospital’s Researcher of the Year Award was handed out at the gala, to Dr. Marc Carrier for leading a clinical trial that will save countless patients with blood clots from unnecessary and potentially harmful tests.
Dr. David Moher received the Grimes Research Career Achievement Award for his pioneering work in combining the results of many different studies to solve medical controversies, and for creating guidelines to improve health research reporting.
The Worton Researcher in Training Award was won by Dr. Carolina Ilkow for her outstanding work in developing cancer-fighting viruses with Dr. John Bell, including a novel virus targeted against pancreatic cancer.
PHILANTHROPY AWARDS
The best way to avoid a bad case of the Novembers is by attending the always-uplifting Association of Fundraising Professionals’ Ottawa Philanthropy Awards. That’s when folks who’ve given so much of their time and/or money to charity get up on stage to accept their award and, in the process, reflect in a meaningful way on what has motivated and inspired them.
This year’s dinner, held Thursday at the Shaw Centre, honoured Smith Petrie Carr & Scott Insurance Brokers president Brian Scott as Outstanding Volunteer Fundraiser, Costco Wholesale as Outstanding Corporate Philanthropist, student-run charity organization CASCO as Outstanding Philanthropic Group, luxury car dealership Mark Motors as Outstanding Small Business, Maxwell Rapley as Outstanding Youth, and Subhas (Sam) Bhargava and his wife, Uttra, as Outstanding Individual Philanthropist.
The evening’s guest speaker was Jonathan Pitre, 15, of Russell, described as a “true local hero” by philanthropic businessman Dan Greenberg. Pitre suffers from — but is bringing greater awareness to — a rare and painful skin disorder called epidermolysis bullosa (EB).
For more coverage — including of last week’s Canadian Tire Snowsuit Fund Gala with honourary co-chairs Chris and Erin Phillips — go online at ottawacitizen.com.